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With a week of the regular tax season to go (I'm not forgetting about those extensions), spammers and schemers have upped their game. I've received a number of notifications about my tax refund via email (four today alone)… only I'm not getting a tax refund. And the bigger tip-off: the IRS wouldn't send a notification about a potential problem or unexpected refund via email.

The latest one looks like this:

If you read it carefully, you can tell pretty quickly that it's a fake. There are a few variations on a theme circulating, too, and they all say pretty much the same thing. Clearly, the spammers are hoping that you won’t read carefully. So be smart.

Remember that the IRS will never initiate contact with you via email. You won't receive an audit notice or request for additional information via email. These emails are intended to either harvest information from you in order to steal your identity or they may contain malware or spyware.

You know the drill. Don't click, just delete. You can also forward to phishing@irs.gov to report the email as abusive.